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Discovering the Uses of Wasted Herring Enzymes

NORWAY - Residual waste from herring should come to better use. Enzymes from herring can be used for washing powder and juice.

Only sixty per cent of herring caught in Norway each year end up in the frying pan or salad. Of a total of 900 tonnes of herring, 360 tons are left over after filleting.

Most of this is leather, bones and intestines. The price of this remaining stock is low, as low as £2.70 for a kilo - as fillets have kilo price of 10-15 million from the factory.

Therefore researcher Diana Lindberg is looking for other uses of the raw materials from herring.

"We are looking for enzymes in the herring remains, and have already found 25 enzymes that seem promising," says Ms Lindberg, who works with herring in a research group at the Marine Biotechnology at Nofima.